


a question for the future

by ncfan



Category: Naruto
Genre: Gap Filler, Gen, Late Night Conversations, Revenge, Sympathy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-18
Updated: 2016-09-18
Packaged: 2018-08-15 20:23:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,906
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8071495
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ncfan/pseuds/ncfan
Summary: "Have you ever thought about what you're gonna do afterwards?"





	

It had been days since Team Hebi had found a city, town, hamlet or even a lone inn on the side of the road, and they’d found themselves becoming far more closely acquainted with charred wildlife than any of them had ever expected to be. The thing was, traveling where there was no friendly inn nearby to sleep in meant they’d been growing rather closely acquainted with the ground as well.

The sky overhead was still dark, though vaguely lightening in the hours before dawn; the moon was obscured by clouds. The night had been warm, ruling out the need for a fire, which was just as well; Sasuke didn’t want there to be such a bright, obvious beacon of where they were camping. They weren’t being followed (not _yet_ , anyways; word of Orochimaru’s death was bound to hit Konoha eventually), and they’d made camp in the forest off of the road, rather than directly by the road itself, but Sasuke had learned caution in Oto. Or had tried to learn it. They were better off camped out somewhere everybody riding by on a wagon couldn’t see them.

When it came time to decide who would sit watch when, Suigetsu had jumped on first watch like it was a fish he wanted to practice his decapitation technique on. _“I like my sleep to be uninterrupted,”_ he’d snapped, when Karin rolled her eyes at him. Juugo took second, and Karin fourth. That left Sasuke with third watch.

Even in Oto, Sasuke hadn’t had his Sharingan active constantly. It was too much of a drain on his chakra, and the only people dumb enough to try something with Orochimaru’s chosen vessel tended not to be very subtle with either threats or murder attempts. Out here, though, whenever he kept watch, his Sharingan was constantly awhirl, all senses constantly on high alert. Every snapping twig made him tense; every unexpected animal cry, the shriek of an owl or the snort of a deer, had him reaching for his sword. Whether it was Oto nin looking to avenge their master, or his old comrades waiting to drag him back to Konoha for imprisonment or execution, he didn’t care. He wasn’t going to let either get in his way.

It still seemed incredible that it had taken him so much time to get strong enough to take on Itachi. A little over two years spent waiting in frustration, sparring, training, learning his way around the many hideouts and secret haunts of Oto no Kuni. Dreaming of the day he’d waited for half his life now, the day when it would be over.

(Dreaming of things past, as well.)

And in all that time, even using Orochimaru’s sources and contacts as though they were his own, Sasuke still hadn’t been able to pin down where Itachi was hiding. He had no more than a few vague hints, just to say that Itachi wasn’t anywhere south of northern Hi no Kuni, and that he wasn’t anywhere in Kaminari.

Of course, an S-ranked missing nin didn’t survive nearly a decade on the run without being good at hiding, and Itachi had powerful friends. Still, that Sasuke hadn’t been able to start out with any better leads than the ones he had…

The blood cried out to him. The blood staining the floorboards of the Uchiha compound, and the corpses that had bled there, until they were taken away. There was no one else left to avenge them; only Sasuke would do. Every day Itachi lived and Sasuke did not kill him, the cry of the blood grew louder, more insistent.

_I have to find him. I have to find him. I have to find him. I have to avenge our clan…_

What was his being alive worth, if he never made Itachi answer for his crimes?

_I…_

“Sasuke?”

Karin was sitting up, blinking owlishly at him. She slid on her glasses and ran a hand through her tangled hair irritably, trying in vain to smooth it down. She flicked on her flashlight and checked her watch. “Sasuke, my turn for standing watch started an hour ago. Why didn’t you wake me up?”

“…I forgot,” Sasuke said stiffly.

“You _forgot?_ Right.” Karin sat straight up, shaking any remains of sleep from her shoulders. “Listen, Sasuke, if you don’t wanna sleep tonight, that’s fine. You’re gonna be completely useless in the morning,” she added pointedly, “but that’s your business.”

He didn’t respond. He knew those remarks of Karin’s. They didn’t require a response; she had never pressed for one.

Neither of them laid down to sleep. Sasuke kept his Sharingan active, kept periodically scanning the forest for any sign of movement. Karin sat with her legs stretched out in front of her, one crossed on top of the other, looking at him and frowning slightly (It was amazing how the Sharingan brought everything into such sharp focus, even in the dark). Silence from Karin during off-hours was… odd, but she understood the value of not drawing outsiders to their camp as well as Sasuke did.

But eventually, she raised an eyebrow at him. “Soooo… Are you gonna tell me what’s wrong, or am I gonna have to guess?” Karin crossed her arms around her chest. Her voice softened. “I think I already know, anyways.”

“Karin…”

“You told me…” Karin’s forehead creased. “…You told me that he left you alive specifically because he wanted you to try to kill him. Arrogance like that’s bound to catch up to him, sooner or later.”

Someone else might have felt anger. Sasuke felt only relief, that she could guess so accurately. “We have to find him before I can kill him,” he told her, more mildly than he would have told the others. That was why finding a town was so important. In a town, they could try to dig up the Akatsuki’s contacts, figure out something from them.

To that, Karin pointed back at herself and smirked briefly, almost challengingly. “That’s what you’ve got me for, remember? There isn’t a man alive I can’t run down. And once we find him, well, Juugo can smash through brick walls like rice paper when he’s in the right mood, and _that_ lug—“ she jerked her thumb at Suigetsu, who had started to liquefy as he sometimes did when he slept, and was looking a bit puddle-ish as a result “—might not be good for anything else, but he is good to have around in a fight. You’ll get your shot, Sasuke,” Karin said earnestly.

That was something Sasuke had noticed about a lot of the shinobi in Oto, and his three teammates in particular. When he said that he was going to avenge himself on Itachi, no one tried to dissuade him, no one tried to tell him that it was unnecessary, no one even questioned why. They just… understood. Karin and Juugo and Suigetsu, they understood the hunger for justice well. Don’t get between a man and his revenge.

(Still, it wasn’t the worst feeling in the world, to be reminded of that from time to time.)

“Have you ever thought about what you’re gonna do afterwards?” he heard her ask softly.

Sasuke stared at Karin for a moment. He thought he heard a catch in her voice, but he supposed he must have imagined it, for there was no trace of that on her face. Indeed, she looked almost angry, her jaw set defensively. “No,” he replied, “I haven’t.” What happened afterwards had never mattered to him. It had never really been worth planning for.

“Seriously?” Karin’s tone was scolding. “You’ve still got those Leaf nin to worry about, you know. They don’t take desertion kindly in Konoha. And there’s _Juugo_ to consider; you can’t just leave _him_ to his own devices.”

“What about you?” Sasuke didn’t want to talk about what happened after Itachi was dead; he didn’t want to talk about what he was going to do. It had never mattered. It wasn’t worth talking about. “Did you ever think about what you were going to do?”

Karin blinked. “After Orochimaru?” she surmised. She hunched her shoulders, worrying at her lip with her teeth. “I… don’t know, really. I might have just stayed where I was. It’s not like I’ve got anywhere to go back to. I’ve got certain—“ she looked at Sasuke out of narrowed, slightly downcast eyes “— _ambitions_ , but they don’t really work as a plan for life.”

Once, what felt like an eternity ago, she had said something to him. _“I’d be lying if I said I was all that devoted to Orochimaru. You won’t find a lot of people here who are. But this is the only place I’ve got, now. And… it’s the only place where I feel like I matter.”_

Those words had astonished Sasuke when first he heard them. If someone in Konoha had said they didn’t feel particularly loyal to the Hokage, he was pretty sure the ANBU would have been knocking on their doors soon after. But that was then, and now, he thought he understood a little better how someone could follow someone they didn’t feel particularly loyal to, while still feeling like the only place where they mattered was by their leader’s side, following their orders. He’d seen it enough to know what it looked like, at least.

“Have you ever wanted to find the people who razed your village?”

All at once, it was as if someone had lit a fire. Karin’s hair crackled, her eyes blazing. “You offering to _help_ me?” she demanded, all indignation and bitter sarcasm. Something small and quiet sounded underneath, but it was as gone as soon as Sasuke heard it, and he knew not what to call it.

He stayed silent when he meant to say ‘yes.’ Justice wasn’t just for him; anyone who was wronged had a right to it.

But he didn’t get the opportunity to say ‘yes.’ Karin’s shoulders sagged; all the hot, hard light went out of her eyes. “Sasuke,” she said tiredly. “I told you. I don’t even know who they were. I’ve got nothing to go on, and it’s not like I can just waltz into Kusagakure and ask to look at records on attacks on minor villages in the country.” She smiled weakly. “Pretty much the best revenge you can get against people who want you dead is to live. Against people who took everything from you, live just to spite them. That’s what I’ll keep doing.”

It was the revenge of those who had none other left open to them. They both knew it. Those who had had every other means of taking revenge stolen from them, that was what they did. Something to show that they did not accept happily what had been done to them. (And it likely wasn’t just the people who had razed Karin’s village that she was talking about.) Sasuke liked to think that he had more roads open to him than that. He liked to think that.

(But he felt sure, sometimes, that the rug was going to be pulled out from under him, somehow. That something would happen to deny him the right to silence the cry of his clan’s spilled blood.)

“Have you thought about what happens afterwards?” Karin asked softly. Her hair fell over her face, hiding it from view.

“I… don’t know.” It was the only answer he knew to give.


End file.
